


Heartbeat

by Jean_Reyne



Category: Undertale (Video Game)
Genre: Angst, Angst with a Happy Ending, Bullying, Canonical Child Abuse, Child Abuse, Child Neglect, F/M, Female Chara (Undertale), Gen, Heavy Angst, Physical Abuse, Prequel, Suicidal Thoughts, Suicide Attempt, Verbal Abuse
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-14
Updated: 2020-07-14
Packaged: 2021-03-04 18:47:37
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,181
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25271113
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Jean_Reyne/pseuds/Jean_Reyne
Summary: Four times Chara’s cry for help goes unheard, and the one time it does not.
Relationships: Chara & Asriel Dreemurr, Chara/Asriel Dreemurr
Kudos: 37





	Heartbeat

**Author's Note:**

> Fair warning - depictions of child abuse and neglect within. Does have a happy ending though.

**I – Mother**

Chara tended to her mother for three days until it became too much to bear.

The older woman was very sick. Even to her seven-year-old daughter, that much was obvious. She was hot to the touch and sweating so much that her nearly skeletal frame was visible through the thin, soaked sheets.

Halfway through the second day she went delirious with the fever—then that night it broke, for a while, and she was her usual self once again. Then she was sick again by morning leaving Chara with nothing but bruises and memories of a night that felt more like a bad dream and the creeping fear that maybe this time she wasn’t going to get better.

Still, the girl cared for her mother. She brought water and whatever food could be found, even if it meant going hungry herself. She put cold, soaked rags on her the woman’s forehead, washed her down with a wet cloth every evening, did everything she could possibly think to do. Poorly brewed herbal teas and improvised home remedies and prayers to gods she didn’t even believe in—nothing worked.

About a week in, Chara fell ill too.

Her head felt like it was stuffed with cotton and her throat scraped awfully whenever she swallowed. She had no idea what to do. She had no idea if there _was_ anything to do. Perhaps this was just how it would end for them both. It would be nice to die together, she supposed. They were supposed to be family, and that was how that was supposed to work.

For her part, Chara’s mother didn’t shove her away when she lay down beside her. She didn’t make her feel particularly welcome, either, but that was normal enough.

Chara pressed her ear to the woman’s front and listened to the slow _thump-thump-thump_ of her heart. It was erratic, fast and then slow and then fast again, but it was still there, still beating. It was, in its way, a comforting sound.

She listened to her mother’s fading heartbeat and comforted herself with hopes and dreams of what tomorrow might bring

They lay like that, silently. Chara didn’t sleep, was content to lie awake all night next to her mother. Come the next day, though, it all finally came crashing back down around her. The pain and cold and the slow, creeping despair were too much. She found herself crying for help in the early hours of the morning. 

It was pointless, of course. She knew that. It was the dead of winter. No one was up and about, and they were probably snowed in by now anyway. No one cared enough for either of them to come and check, and it wasn’t likely that any passer-by would even hear her calling out, small and hoarse as her voice was. Still, she cried out until her throat started to give, and then she coughed and spluttered and cried out again.

A hand snaked over her shoulder, fingers grasping at her chin and twisting her head back so she was looking over her shoulder. She gave a cry of pain but shut her mouth abruptly at the sight of her mother’s face, red-eyed and ashen-skinned and bleeding from the nose. The woman gave her a cold, flat-eyed look—then slapped her.

She was weak and bedridden, and the angle was all wrong. It couldn’t even really be called a slap, Chara told herself. Still, it stung, and she couldn’t help but tear up a little

“No one likes a damsel, sweetie,” the old woman rasped, though if she was healthy it might’ve been called a snarl. Then she mustered up what little strength she had left and shoved her daughter off onto the floor, and promptly went back to bed.

Her mother died that night. Unbeknownst to the child, the smell would soon attract notice, bringing visitors who would find her. Chara would live. That was the first and only act of kindness she would ever receive from her own mother.

That would be tomorrow. For now, Chara simply laid on the floor where she had fallen and wept until she fell asleep.

She did not call for help again.

____________________________________________________________

**II – Village**

The bottom of the well was wet. Chara was cold. Colder still was the laughter of the others, receding further and further into the distance.

Had they pushed her in, or had she simply fell? She couldn’t quite remember now. Her head hurt something awful. Or maybe that was an excuse, and she was just a coward. Couldn’t bring herself to accept that the others could hate her _this_ much.

She was beginning to hate them too, though, so she supposed it was fair.

“Help,” she said, once she couldn’t hear the mob of children any longer. Then, louder, “Hello? I need help!” 

True to form, the villagers, if they heard her, did not come. By now, she expected nothing less of them. When she was brought here after her mother died, she assumed that the orphanage was situated in a remote village because it was nice and pretty and had lots of space.

Now, though, she suspected that it was because there was nowhere to run away to.

She’d been glad, at first, that the orphanage was in a different village. She hated the old one, the old people. She’d been a fool to think that the new one would be any different. The same apathy, selfishness, cruelty, violence, spite—always the same. It was like she’d never even left home.

The girl—Chara refused to say her name, to even think of it—had seemed different, at first. They’d only known one another for a month or so, but Chara had hesitantly come to call the other girl an acquaintance. Not a friend, not yet, but she thought they were getting there. Then the others cornered them, though, cornered _Chara,_ boxed her in and pushed her towards the well with rough hands and loud jeers.

“Help,” she had called, desperate, to anyone who might hear her. “Help,” she had tried again, calling out to the girl, and then they all looked back at the other girl with sharp, questioning eyes, judgment clear on their faces, and—

Her ‘friend’ locked eyes with her for a moment and then said, coldly, dispassionately, “I don’t know her.”

The others simply laughed at the stricken expression on Chara’s face.

A twang of pain snapped her from her thoughts. She didn’t want to call for help again, not really. She wanted to sit here and never see anyone else ever again, but her ankle—something had given. It wasn’t sitting right. She took a breath and mustered up her courage and glanced down at it and—yes, it was twisted weirdly at a weird angle. It was far from the most painful thing that’d ever happened to her—far, _far_ from it—but there was something oddly unsettling about seeing her foot _bend_ that way that spurred her on to call out again.

“Help!” Nothing. “I—I’ve fallen down. My ankle is—I need help.” 

Nothing.

“Anyone?”

Her voice echoed off the stony walls as though taunting her.

“Please!” she screamed. 

There was only the faint rush of wind and birdsong above. Freedom, just out of reach. And beneath it, the rhythmic thump of her own heart. A little faster than usual, but she wasn’t panicking yet.

Chara calmed herself, slowed her breathing, listened to the beating in her chest. When she was little, far littler, she had taken real comfort in it. It was soft and warm and soothing in a world where nothing else was. Now, though, she caught herself thinking that it had to be wrong, that a creature like her couldn’t have a heart. And if she did, she wondered if it might be better if she didn’t—or if the one she had would _stop._

That would probably make the other children _very_ happy, though, and the village too. A cold, spiteful voice in her head told her that she would _not_ give them the satisfaction.

For now, that felt like reason enough for her heart to keep beating, and so she sat there and listened to it beat.

____________________________________________________________

**III – Matron**

It was not as though the Matron couldn’t hear her crying for help. She could. Chara was sure the whole village might hear her if she screamed any louder.

Nor was it true that the old woman was entirely without mercy—rarely, she was known to take pity on a soft, sweet, well-behaved child.

No, the simple, ugly truth was that, at the moment, she didn’t feel like it. It pleased her greatly to hear Chara cry alone in the closet, and so alone in the closet she would remain.

So, there was no sense in crying. It would simply wear out her throat. Worse, it might irritate the Matron further, and that probably wouldn’t be a good time. There was something almost comical about that understatement.

Chara took deep, shuddering breaths to calm herself. Though there was plenty of air, she felt like she was suffocating.

“Please,” she rasped. “Let me out. I can’t—it’s too small.”

“What’s the magic word?” came the singsong reply.

“…Please?” Chara repeated, confused. Had she misheard, or—

“I can’t hear you, precious,” the Matron cooed, a gross parody of the way she talked to the little children, the ones in the village. The person she pretended to be.

“Please,” Chara croaked, “let me _out,_ th—”

“Speak up!”

It was a trick, Chara knew, it was a trick to humiliate her, to hurt her. She shouldn’t fall for it. She wouldn’t, she told herself—but the walls were so close together, so dusty, clogging her throat up. She was thin and bony and her hips and elbows and knees knocked painfully against the wooden walls as she shivered.

“Please,” she sobbed. The word tore itself from her throat and left her feeling as pathetic as she must have sounded.

“Please _what,_ girl?” goaded the woman.

“Please, ma’am—”

“What was that?” Her voice took on a sharp edge, then, irritated.

Chara bit her lip so hard it bled. An angry flame flared to life inside her and for a moment she felt determined to resist the Matron and her sick little games, she was fuelled by hate, hate, hate—but the closet walls seemed to crush her and choke her and the little flame went out almost as quickly as she had felt it come to life.

“…Please, _mother,”_ she spat, the word foul-tasting in her mouth. “Please let me out.”

There was dead silence for a long moment, and Chara held her breath. That was it, wasn’t it? That was what she was supposed to call the Matron. When they were alone. When no one else was watching, listening. Not that it mattered. No one ever helped. No one ever came.

When at last the Matron spoke it was in that awful saccharine tone that made Chara sick to the stomach.

“Of course, sweetie,” the woman said sweetly. Then, with a terrifying mirthfulness, “Just as soon as I’m convinced you’ve learned your lesson.”

Chara dug her nails into the wood of the closet. “I didn’t,” she choked, “didn’t do—I didn’t, they’re lying, liars, I—”

The Matron tutted. “That’s not very nice, is it? Calling your brothers and sisters liars…”

“They’re _not—”_ Chara stopped and clamped her mouth shut and ground her teeth and fought the urge to yell. They were _nothing_ of the sort. She hated them. She hated them. She hated them.

“I hate them,” she whispered aloud, unable to stop herself. “I hate them. I hate—”

The closet doors buckled outward, and she froze. They weren’t open, but they had been pulled back, widening the crack between them—and through it there was a single dull, beady eye staring through at her.

“Say that again,” the Matron demanded. Her voice wasn’t sweet anymore, but it was flat and ominous and awful and Chara couldn’t bring herself to be thankful for the change. Terror settled in the pit of her stomach like a stone, and she began shivering.

“I didn’t mean it,” she whispered.

“Liar,” came the cold answer.

“I didn’t,” she insisted, voice bordering on hysterical. “I didn’t mean it. I didn’t.” There was no reply, no sound, nothing. The eye continued boring a hole into her face, and she shrank down, bringing her knees up to her chest.

“I didn’t, I didn’t, I didn’t,” she babbled. “Didn’t mean it. I didn’t mean it.”

Nothing.

“I didn’t mean it, m—” she choked on the word, but she was desperate, desperate for air. “M-mother,” she gasped. “Please, mother, I didn’t mean it, please let me out—”

“What are you?” the Matron snapped.

“I’m… I’m a freak,” she sobbed. “I’m a freak and a thief. I’m a thief. I’m a freak—

“Where do you belong?” 

“You,” Chara said without a moment’s hesitation, panic clawing its way up her throat now. No matter how determined she was to resist, it always ended this way with the Matron. “Here, you, I don’t—you—"

“Good,” came the reply, softer now. The closet doors creaked open a little further. She could see the Matron’s face now, see the lamp on her desk, her ajar door. The air from outside was sweet, fresh. It felt like hope, almost. “Now, why are you being punished?”

Chara swallowed thickly. “I—I stole,” she lied. The others stole. The others stole and blame it on her. She knew, they knew, the Matron knew, but—“I stole,” she repeated. “Wine, from the chef’s—I stole it.” The lies burned her throat going up, she felt, but it was better than the alternative, and anything, _anything_ to get out of this box.

“Good,” the Matron crooned, voice soft again. The closet doors opened a little wider. Her arm snaked through, slow. Chara fought with all her strength not to flinch away—the Matron wouldn’t like that _one bit._ She couldn’t help squeezing her eyes shut, though, or whimpering a little, or the wall of nausea that rose in her when the woman stroked her hair and rubbed the back of her head. A sick parody of—of—of what a mother was supposed to be, maybe. She didn’t know. The only ‘mother’ Chara had ever known was… not much better than this.

“And what,” the woman continued, “should be your punishment?” Her hand trailed its way from her scalp down the side of her head, caressing her cheek, her jaw, her neck, until finally she took Chara’s chin in between her finger and thumb and tilted her head upwards, forced their eyes to meet.

“I…” Chara swallowed. It was a trap. She knew it was. The Matron wanted her to consign herself to her own nightmare, willingly. No other answer would be accepted. But the doors—she could breathe again, sweet cool air. She didn’t want them to close again, didn’t want to go back in the closet.

“Maybe… I can clean?” she said, swallowing thickly. “Somewhere, anywhere, and—no dinner? No food, for… as long as you say, and…” The Matron’s expression grew harder and colder until it was as smooth and flat as a river stone, a stone which settled in Chara’s belly and she knew, she _knew_ she’d answered wrong.

“Wait,” she said suddenly, frantically. “Wait!”

The arm withdrew from her face and snaked back out through the doors. Desperate, Chara threw herself at the light, at escape. The Matron slammed the doors shut, hitting her in the face at full force. She saw stars, and for a moment she was dazed and winded until she heard the tell-tale clink of a latchkey and she was locked in again. Four hard walls and a too-low ceiling and a bottom she couldn’t sit on, it was too small, she had to stand, but she couldn’t breathe—

“Please,” she whimpered, pleaded, begged. She heard footsteps receding, quiet laughter from the hallway, then nothing. Nothing but her own breathing, frantic and short and disgusting.

“Please,” she said to no one. “Please.”

Her own breathing sounded awful and rattly in the too-small space. She wished it’d just stop. All of it.

“I didn’t do anything,” she whimpered. She felt like crying, but nothing came out. It caught inside, hot and tangled. “I didn’t.”

She shut her eyes, shut out the walls and everything outside the doors. She curled in on herself, knees tight to her chest and arms around her legs, and she held still and listened until she found her heart. It beat quickly, then slow, slow, slow, slower yet as her breathing calmed.

Ironic, that she should be calmed by the sound of her own beating heart, that which tied her to the life she hated so fiercely—but that was a silly, melodramatic thought, even if it was true.

Chara pretended that the staccato _thump-thump-thump_ of her heart was someone thumping on the doors, someone coming to rescue her.

_“I’ll save you,”_ they would say, in the grand tradition of heroes and heroines. _“Don’t worry. I’ll save you.”_

_“Help,”_ she would say.

“Help,” she _did_ say, aloud, a strangled whisper.

…But no one came.

____________________________________________________________

**IV – Traveller**

The man arrived on the last day of Autumn.

He said he was just passing through, on his way to visit distant family. He was a musician, though, a musician with a pretty red violin. When he played it, it sounded like the evening sky and the morning dew. The villagers bade him stay with them, at least for a night or two—their lives were dull and boring and meaningless, so of course they would offer their meagre hospitality in return for entertainment.

Chara wanted to tell him it wasn’t worth it, to tell him to leave and never look back. He seemed… kind. He played with the children, played _for_ the children. Never shouted or screamed. Never so much as frowned. He was polite and soft-spoken and he had eyes that were, if not gentle, placid. She didn’t think he had it in him to hurt anyone.

When she called out it was with the tiny, fleeting hope that maybe, maybe people outside the village were good. Maybe she had simply been unlucky, moved from one bad town to the next. Maybe there _were_ good people in the world and she had yet to meet them. Or maybe it was desperation, not hope. The lined was blurred sometimes.

Maybe, maybe, maybe.

The traveller’s head snapped towards her as he walked past, eyes fixing on her face, on the swelling around her eye and the bruises on her jaw. It was a full moon and the lanterns were lit and there was plenty of light. She _knew_ he could see the bruises.

It looked like he did. His eyes widened, his smile dropped a little, his gait stiffened. For a moment it looked like he would slow, stop, respond—it looked like he might _answer_ her.

Then something strange and pained flashed in his eyes, and he turned away. She watched his receding figure for a moment until he disappeared back into the village proper. He did not look back.

Chara felt the insane urge to laugh.

What was that look in his eyes? Pity, shame, fear, remorse? Maybe none. Maybe it was simply awkwardness or something, like when she was forced to sit next to someone and they wouldn’t speak to her and she wouldn’t speak to them but neither of them could get away for a moment. Or maybe she reminded him of something he didn’t want to be reminded of. Maybe he just didn’t care.

Maybe, maybe, maybe. 

Perhaps if she’d said something, but what was there to say? _Please, take me with you, spirit me away to some fantasy place where the people are people and not monsters in disguise, and—_

She did laugh, then, aloud. Quiet and shaky. There was no one around to hear it, anyway.

“Help,” she said aloud, then laughed because it sounded so stupid. She wondered why she had even bothered.

“Help!” she laughed, falling flat on her butt and holding her sides as she laughed. “Help, help, help.” She said the word until it sounded weird, felt odd in her mouth like it wasn’t a real world. Like she’d made it up. Maybe she had. That was funny. She giggled without smiling, then laid there quietly.

Idly, she pressed a hand to her chest and felt her heart thumping gently away.

After a little while she grew tired and lay flat on her back in the grass. Normally she liked to watch the stars, but tonight they were covered in clouds. Instead she just traced the horizon with her eyes, watching the countryside disappear, until—

The mountain rose up like a great slumbering beast, tucked away between thick forest and dark sky. No one ever went there, of course. Not because it wasn’t allowed—it was said sometimes that no one who went there ever returned, but of course that was probably just an old wives’ tale to stop curious children from wandering off. Besides, there was no reason to go there. There was nothing there, not really. Just a nondescript mountain in the middle of boring, ordinary countryside. 

Still, it was something to look at. She forgot, sometimes, how huge it was. She saw it every day. It blended into the background.

Looking at it now, though, it seemed… closer. Closer than she had thought it was.

Chara blinked at the distant landmark, trying to quell the sudden emptiness in her stomach. It wasn’t fear or anxiousness or unease. It was simply a—a longing for something she couldn’t name.

No one who went there ever returned.

Her heart quickened. 

She tore her eyes from it with great hesitation. Picked herself up, went back to the orphanage. The Matron must’ve been either tired or in good spirits—she didn’t punish her for being late, not really. Just slapped her and ordered her to turn in without dinner. She obeyed.

The dormitory was hot and stuffy, stuffier than normal. She lay awake until midnight, thinking. When at last she fell asleep, it was fitful and restless. She dreamed of the mountain, tall stone slopes and thick black forests and pits that might swallow you whole. That empty-inside feeling returned. Like having an empty stomach but instead it was her heart that was empty. A longing.

Would anyone come after her, she wondered, if she left?

The others never talked about it. It amazed her, that day—she realised how amazing it was that they could all go about their days as if everything was fine, everything was normal. Like they were asleep.

_Can you hear it,_ she wanted to ask, _out there, in the dark? Calling to us._ Her heartbeat thundered in her ears. She felt, for the first time, like she had woken up. That evening they all climbed into bed again and dozed off without a care in the world, but not her. She didn’t think she could ever sleep again. 

She left the night after that.

____________________________________________________________

**V – Him**

Chara didn’t intend to call for help this time.

She hadn’t intended to survive the fall either, though. It was funny in a cruel, awful way, and when she opened her mouth and gurgled, _“Help”,_ she almost laughed out loud. Almost.

The hilarity was short-lived, and then that cold feeling of shame and powerlessness pooled in her gut again, overpowering the pain for a brief moment.

_Here we are again,_ it seemed to say, _just like old times. Just like always. Nothing ever changes._

Chara didn’t consider for even the slightest fraction of a second that someone would answer. Her only hope was that she would die of her injuries, whatever they were. Quickly, if possible, but she knew better than to hope for painless.

_You deserve this,_ she thought to herself. _You—_

“—ded like it came from over here.”

That was another voice, not her own. Not in her head, either—it echoed off of the rocky walls of… wherever she was. It was high and youthful and soft, and—but no, that was impossible. She was at the bottom of some mountain cave, bleeding to death. It was just a hallucination. No one was coming.

No one ever came.

“You deserve this,” she told herself, aloud, though it came out muffled and choked in a gurgle of—blood or spit, or maybe vomit. It didn’t really matter at this point. There was no one to find her.

“Oh,” came that voice again. “You’ve fallen down, haven’t you?”

There was no one here. No one ever came.

“Are you okay?”

Obviously not, she wanted to say, but she didn’t really feel like talking to herself at the moment.

“Here, get up.”

No one, no one, no one—

There were hands on her, then, and normally she would have fought them off. Now, though, she didn’t even have the strength to panic. Perhaps that was shock. Or maybe it was because this was a hallucination. Why panic over her own delusions, anyway?

“What’s your name?”

…Well, if her stupid mind was going to insist on this stupid game, she figured she may as well play along. Perhaps it would distract her from dying.

“…Chara,” she rasped at last. She waited, waited to be told that that wasn’t a real name, and—

“Chara, huh?” The voice was still light, but now it had an air of concern to it, as though the speaker was calming themselves deliberately. Or perhaps calming her, but why would it care?

“That’s a nice name.”

At that, Chara’s eyes shot open. The measured tone, the gentle words—there was no way she would hallucinate something, someone, so…so…

“My name’s Asriel,” the voice continued. “Asriel Dreemurr. Here, let me help y—oh!”

Finally, it set in—that this was a real live person pawing at her—and the panic came with it, and the anger, and a dozen other nameless awful emotions that told her to dig her claws into the stranger’s flesh and rip and tear until they went away. Chara did just that, her hands flying to where the newcomer was trying to get a grip on her. Her fingers tightened as she grabbed a fistful of—

…Fur?

“Hey now, careful,” the voice chirped. “Golly, you’ve got a strong grip!”

Slowly, she looked up. Her eyes travelled past black trousers and a green striped sweater to a round, furry white head with long floppy ears and soft eyes set in it. The boy, or creature, or whatever it was, stared right back at her.

“Umm,” it—he—said awkwardly. “Can I help you stand up? I can take you to m—”

“You’re…” Chara swallowed thickly. Her throat felt dry and cracked. How long had she been laying there? “What are you?”

The boy cocked his head at her. “Well, gee, I’m a monster!” That reply was entirely too cheerful and didn’t quite make sense to her, but—

“You’re—you aren’t…” Her eyes felt glazed, unfocused, but she forced herself to _look_ at him when she spoke to him. “You’re not a human?”

He laughed, then, a soft little laugh without a hint of spite or malice. It was the strangest sound she had ever heard. She hadn’t ever heard a laugh so pure before, so innocent. Not spiteful or cruel or nasty, just—happy, maybe.

“Of course not, silly!” He shook his head.

…Seemed he did have a bit of a sassy streak, though.

“I’m a monster,” he repeated. “ _You’re_ the human!”

If it weren’t for his cheery disposition, Chara would’ve taken that as an insult. Perhaps it still was, even if the… monster… didn’t realise it.

“A monster,” she mumbled. Not a human, then.

“So?” He shifted from one foot to another. Not impatiently, though—it seemed more like… eagerness. “Can I help you?” Yes, he sounded _eager_ to help.

“What,” Chara said dumbly.

The monster frowned. “You’re hurt,” he said. “We can heal you! I’ll just take you to my parents—”

“Parents?” Chara took a deep breath—or tried to, but then her ribs rattled painfully and she ended up exhaling instead. “Are… are they—”

“Monsters too? Yeah!” A pause. “Is that… okay? I know it seems scary, but—”

“No,” Chara cut in. “Sounds… fine.” She’d chuckle bitterly, but it would sound like the laboured breathing of a wounded dog or something, and she had the feeling that would worry the monster even more.

Idly, she reflected on the hilarity of that sentiment.

“Alrighty,” chirped the boy. “Hold on tight, then, okay? I’ll try be slow!”

“No need,” Chara mumbled, and as the monster reached down she took his hand and _heaved_ herself up. “Let’s go.” The effect was diminished somewhat when she promptly sagged against his shoulder and he had to support half her weight.

With that, they set off together down what looked like a path, though it was too dark—and her head hurt too much—to say for sure. She didn’t really care though.

The monster—Asriel, she remembered—squawked something about being careful. He slipped an arm under and around her, righting her just as she was about to stumble.

“Thanks,” she tried to say. It came out a brutish grunt. How uncivil.

Asriel, however, seemed to understand. “It’s okay,” he said gently.

They fell into step together. As she began to feel her injuries more keenly, she leaned on him more and more. Finally her bloodied head flopped to the side, her body too exhausted to keep it up, falling on Asriel’s shoulder. He simply shuffled a little to better cushion it on the soft, furry pillow of his arm.

In this position, Chara could feel what she assumed was his heartbeat. It didn’t sound anything like her own, though; it was fainter, but more constant, a distant thrumming sound in his body that neither sped up nor slowed down as they walked and climbed. There was something mesmerising to it, and she let out a soft breath.

Perhaps Asriel interpreted that as distress, because he made a soft noise in the back of his throat and awkwardly rubbed her back.

“You’re fine,” he gentled. “You’ll see. Everything’s going to be okay now.”

That was fool-talk, she thought, though she had neither the energy nor the heart to say that to him. Still. Perhaps it was that strange softness in his eyes and voice, or maybe she was just dizzy from her fall, but some small, stupid part of her desperately wanted to believe him. That was a problem for another time, though. For now, she focused on putting one foot in front of the other without dragging Asriel to the ground with her, listening to the ethereal thumping of his heart.

If his behaviour was any indication, Chara thought, it must have been a big one.

**Author's Note:**

> This isn't beta-read or particularly polished - I just had the idea and decided to write it on a whim. A counterpoint of sorts to Chasriel fluff. Love their dynamic and thought it'd be fun to explore their experiences with humans vs with monsters; fixated on their cry for help as an example, since it's sort of a powerful moment in the story. 
> 
> At their lowest, most awful moment, Chara cries out for help, and this time someone's there to help them up. I thought that was a nice little part of the Asriel-Chara dynamic, so here it is. Hope you enjoyed.


End file.
